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THE STRESS OF STORMS HONORIS CAUSA
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THE STRESS OF STORMS HONORIS CAUSA
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JORGE LUIS BORGES
(1899-1986)
Argentinean writer brought up essentially in a European culture (Buenos Aires, 1899, Geneva, 1986). He lived in Europe during World War II. In 1918, he went to Spain where he joined literary groups that developed the ultraist movement. In 1921, he returned to his country.
Borges’ literary works are vast since he was a translator, essay writer, poet and over all a supreme narrator. It was his stories that brought him world fame. His most known works are Universal History of Infamy (1935), The Garden of Forking Paths (1941) and we can also mention Ficciones, his masterpiece (1944). Other works are: The Aleph (1949), The Maker (1960), Doctor Brodie’s Report (1970), The Book of Sand (1975), Blue Tiger and The Rose of Paracelsus (1977). Together with Bioy Casares and Silvina Ocampo he published Anthology of Fantastic Literature (1940) and Six Problems for Don Isidro Parodi (1943). They used the pseudonym H. Bustos Domecq.
In 1946, Peron dismissed him from a position in the National Library and appointed him Inspector of Poultry and Rabbits in the Public Markets. In 1950 he was made president of ‘The Argentine Writers’ Society. In 1976, the academic Arthur Ludkvist stated that Borges would never win the Nobel Prize due to political reasons.
In 1979, he shared the Cervantes Award with Gerardo Diego. In 1983, the Spanish government issued him the Grand Cross of the Civil Order of Alfonso X el Sabio. In 1984, he received a Doctorate Honoris Causa from the University of Rome.
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HONORIS CAUSA
I am stalking them at the market’s exit, hiding completely from their senses. They bought wine and a delicious meaty rabbit ready with everything, even the seasonings, to bake at the house of their mentor.
I wanted to warn them that the rabbit wasn’t a very good idea, but I never get used to markets and, besides, those who sent me to spy on them have forbidden me to influence their mortal minds. On the other hand, I have total license to read their thoughts. That is how I found out that they still have not found the best way to break the bad news to their teacher.
The rabbit, well chosen by Silvina Ocampo, has nothing to do with my mission… I just mentioned it because I wanted to… The task I was assigned by Esmeredis, a heresiarch wizard from Uqbar, focuses on the XLVI volume of The Anglo-American Encyclopedia specifically on an article inserted on page 918. This article reveals certain facts about Tlön that even a blind man could interpret, and the tenacious Adolfo Bioy Casares has managed to get it in a book sale this morning.
Now he is taking it to his counselor’s home with the intention of discussing it.
They are walking down the busy streets of Buenos Aires, Argentina, where during these early months of the year 1945 General Juan Domingo Peron has recently assumed political command.
With an intentional delay they head towards the house of the Argentinean ultraist Jorge Luis Borges, who is a true pain in the neck for Uqbar’s heresiarchs and friend and mentor to this young couple of writers… Wait, I have to listen to what those two are saying now.
“I don’t know, Silvina, I don’t know how to tell him. He is so dependent on his….”
“We will find the way. Calm down!”
“Since we have met that man he has only given us good news… How can we come and drop this on him?”
“Yes, Bioy,… I remember his twisted little laughs when he announced that the Anthology of Fantastic Literature that we three wrote was going to be published.”
“Oh… hush, Silvina, that reminds me of the other one, the anthology of Argentinean poetry. Remember Borges demands: ‘I don’t want any confessional or sentimental poems! Just only what has revelations in images and metaphors!’”
“How can I forget, Bioy? I was the one who read him hundreds of Argentinean poems and, at the first sight of sentimentalism or confessional feelings, he would yell:
‘Next! Next! That one can be read by his girlfriend or priest but it’s not for our anthology!’”
“It was hard work, but he always had a way to make it pleasant.”
“See what you did, Bioy? Now I am also afraid to give him the news,” said Silvina.
Phew! No problem… luckily just an insubstantial dialog and ambiguous rambling that has nothing to do with the guarded encyclopedic volume that Casares won’t release from underneath his arm.
My mission is for the volume never to reach the hands of that Homer of caves and I have not managed to make Bioy let go of it.
Gods of Tlön! We are already at the Palermo neighborhood. From here, on 2135 Serrano Street, you can see the garden of the poet’s house.
Those mortals with their mundane afflictions… I also drag mine as I crawl like a reptile, heavy and slow… You don’t know how cruel the wizard Esmerdis can be to those who fail him.
“Have you thought of what to tell him?” asks the man with the book under his arm to his wife.
“I am not telling him! No way! You do it!” answers the woman holding the rabbit.
We come in through the ever open doors of Borges’ house and we head for his esoteric studio where we see him sitting in a large chair. Right there, glowing through his physical blindness, he dictates fictions to Maria Kodama, his secretary and loyal guide.
When Borges hears the steps (theirs), he recognizes them.
“Silvina, Bioy… What have you brought for dinner this afternoon?” He takes his cane and the very helpful Maria walks him to his friends.
The three of them then embrace in a fraternal hug as always. My book falls on the floor and is picked up by the Japanese woman, who puts it indifferently on a shelf.
I had captured the book in Casares’ arms before with my spy camera.
However, the only picture I was able to develop was the three headed Don Honorio Bustos Domeq, the pseudonym they used to publish the police adventures of Isidro Parodi, a good friend of mine by the way.
“Why so sad?” asks the sensitive Borges.
“Well… you see… what happened is….” Unable to continue, Bioy Casares turns his back.
“Tell me, Silvina, you have always been the bravest… With what horrible news you come to my house today?” Here I thought for a moment that the clairvoyant had seen me.
“This morning Peron’s followers captured Dona Leonor (his mother) and Nora (his sister),” blurts out Silvina in one breath.
I must confess to you that it was the heresiarchs of Uqbar, brains and magicians of the secrets of Tlön, who manipulated the poet’s erratic destiny. They even poisoned the minds of the Swedish academicians, so the Nobel Price would never be awarded to him and that way he would not have more time or money to meddle in mysteries forbidden to mortals.
“I know,” Borges answers sadly, walking towards his desk. “Prison for brave women! While so many men keep quiet.” Angrily, he grabs a bunch of pens and quills from his working table and says, “But let’s not waste time, people! There are many stones to cast on the regime and many, many more to cast onto eternity.
”These last words set on edge my ethereal body because I was afraid the situation would call the attention on that compromising book that everyone had already forgotten since they were drowning in their own frivolity.
I renew my vows of faith! Because Tlön’s magic is powerful and the same way a fish dies through the mouth the genius is once again trapped by decoys of humanity. YES!
However, I must say we never managed to blind this Borges completely.
Still now, during this spring of 1976, I camp with these writers, to safeguard the interests of Uqbar, and this Borges, who celebrated with joy the earthly overthrow of Peron’s party by the Argentinean Military Council, today regrets it when Videla’s inhumane repression measures its power by deaths per hour.
Right now I am following him, Ernesto Sabato and a dozen other writers that will meet with the government council’s president to protest for their “missing”
colleagues. Soon the Plaza de Mayo will shelter thousands with those same intentions.
But let us go back to 1945… to Borges’ house.
Here Silvina and Bioy exchange a look of misgiving, since they do not want to get involved in political affairs.
Resting in his chair, the poet smiles to dissipate the tension.
“I also have something to tell you,” he says as he touches the desk’s cluttered surface, looking for a recent government document that he recognizes easily by its official bulky seals and letterheads. He places his hand over the document and keeps talking.
“The new government has removed me from my boring position as a librarian.
Instead they have named me…,” and throwing out his chest he continues in a fake military voice, “Superb Inspector of All the Poultry and Each and Every Wretched Rabbit in the Buenos Aires’ market... An ‘honoris causa’ title that I will be forced to decline because of the little inconvenient detail of my blindness,” he concludes with the sarcasm such a cruel joke deserves.
Bioy’s eyes cannot hide his sadness.
I, on the other hand, sigh at ease, since Tlön’s secrets are safe under the great human vicissitudes.
Silvina quickly and ashamedly hides behind her back the bag containing the rabbit they have bought at the market for their troubled mentor’s dinner.
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| ANTERIOR | ÍNDICE | SIGUIENTE |
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© Alberto Sibaja Álvarez. San José, Costa Rica
® The Stress of Storms
